Google Maps and Google Earth are morphing into visualization tools for marine data, called, oddly enough, Google Ocean. Google Maps (GM) on the web and Google Earth (GE) as a 3D interactive atlas software application are ideal tools for sharing geographical information in a simple way. Google Ocean is rumored to contain 3D oceanographic maps with underwater
topography, search features for spots and attractions, and also have
zooming and panning features. Much like Google Earth and Sky, you will
be able to overlay layers on top of the oceanographic maps, such as
weather patterns, currents, temperatures, shipwrecks, coral reefs, worldwide tide predictions, weather, magnetic declination and
algae blooms.

An Australian geologist, Arthur Hickman, has discovered a rare meteorite impact crater in remote Western Australia using Google Earth to conduct research on channel ore deposits. It looks as though the Hickman Crater will be Australia's second largest preserved rim crater – one that has not eroded significantly from its original shape. The crater's rim, which is 80 per cent preserved, stands 30 meters above its floor, and consists mainly of rhyolite, a rock similar to granite.

The best place for landing man on the moon is on the South Pole at Aitken Basin .

Much of the area around the Moon's south pole is within the Aitken Basin (shown in blue on the lunar topography image), a giant impact crater 1,550 miles in diameter and 7.5 miles deep at its lowest point. Many smaller craters exist on the floor of this basin. Many of those craters never see sunlight and are thought to contain water ice.

Antarctica
has always been one of those destinations that people have longed to
visit. For those of us without the bank balances to reach the frosty snows of South Pole, another option is here.

Working
together and using images primarily from the American Landsat
spacecraft, US and UK researchers have pasted together more than a
thousand images of Antarctica. The result is a magnificent
high-definition image of Antarctica.

Supposedly
10 times more detailed than ever before, the The Landsat Image Mosaic
of Antarctica can be viewed through a free website, and will also be
included virtual globe projects like Google Earth.

One of the most popular features of Google has been their mapping programs. Their continued efforts to acquire the best satellite imagery of everywhere has let the average computer user to zoom in on archaeological and geographical sites that, prior to its inception, had been reserved for scientists with satellite imagery at their finger tips.

Unlike NASA's map of the Universe, there are no more "white spaces" on the map of our planet.

What there is, however, is an intricate new human-created strata of annotation and personal discovery that's changing the very nature of cartography and personal terrestrial vision with the new tools created over the past two years by map providers like Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo.

Users of Google Earth may soon be able to listen to the sounds that accompany satellite photos. Wild Sanctuary, a Californian company has created software that can layer relevant recorded sounds over locations in Google Earth from a database of over 3,500 hours of soundscapes from all over the world.

Dr. Bernie Krause, founder of Wild Sanctuary has spent the last 40 years collecting sounds, and his recordings include more than 15,000 animal noises, and sounds from a huge array of habitats, including cities, deserts, mountains and the marine environment. It is the largest library in existence of natural sound. Image of Mt St Helens, for example, would be accompanied by sounds of volcanic activity.

Krause has traveled the world from pole to pole, recording the sounds of nature in the wild -everything from insect larva to bathing hippopotamuses, from crashing ice floes to a cottonwood tree sucking up water after a rain storm.

WikiSky does for the cosmos what Google Earth and Microsoft's Virtual Earth does for the Pale Blue Dot. The team at Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) have put together WikiSky. Using a cool graphical interface, visitors can zoom in or out on stars or constellations, pulling up detailed astronomical data collected from SDSS's survey.

SDSS is an ambitious sky mapping project to create detailed optical images covering more than a quarter of the sky, and a 3-dimensional map of about a million galaxies and quasars. The map links to spectacular photos galleries of galaxies, globulars, clusters, nebulae, Quasars, and, totally cool, ETI's. Posted by Casey Kazan.

Google extended its Google Maps service for mobile on U.S. Windows Mobile devices. This version of Google Maps for mobile enables users to view interactive maps and satellite imagery, find local businesses, get point-to-point driving directions, and view live traffic updates. The Windows Mobile 5.0 version of Google Maps for mobile is also GPS-enabled, allowing users whose mobile devices support GPS functionality to view their current location.